


Baisemain

by ThatWasntSoBad



Series: Phoenix Shepard/Kaidan Alenko [8]
Category: Mass Effect Trilogy
Genre: F/M, Fluff, Set During ME3, That's it, some silliness from bad flirting but not much
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-11-20
Updated: 2020-11-20
Packaged: 2021-03-10 06:42:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,024
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27649037
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ThatWasntSoBad/pseuds/ThatWasntSoBad
Summary: Baisemain - the act of hand-kissing (most notably men kissing the back of a lady's hand in greeting or when leaving during the times of the gentry. That is not the case with this fic).
Relationships: Kaidan Alenko/Female Shepard
Series: Phoenix Shepard/Kaidan Alenko [8]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1720840
Comments: 2
Kudos: 6





	Baisemain

Phoenix winced slightly. Not because she was in pain, but because the cut to Kaidan’s side, close to his ribs, looked worse than it actually was. She didn’t know how he did it, or entirely sure when. Nor did she know what did it - it was hard to tell in the darkness of the caverns, the cave passages where water trickled. She suspected that a sharper piece of rock had somehow managed to tear the fabric.

“What did Chakwas say?” It was with great care that she had begun to clean it again.

"Redress three times a day just to make sure. It shouldn't have a negative effect on work, but she told me to take it easy for a couple of days."

"I was looking forward to seeing you in action again.” Phoenix cast him a small smile as she worked, a brief look that had her witnessing a brief moment of surprise from the major before he rose a brow, lips curving into a smile. “What’s that look for?” It was an amusing moment to her, despite the heat she felt creep onto her cheeks as she shifted through her first aid kit.”  
  
“Is that a ‘being nice’ Phoenix line, or an attempt at flirting?”

She cleared her throat. “Could be either or you know.” He hummed, not believing her for one second. “What? You are _very_ interesting to watch - I mean, uh,” she felt his eyes on her, his expression more than likely widening to one of smugness, a flirt in and of itself. It did nothing to soothe the blush upon her face. Her fingers itched to scratch at her nose, at her brow - but she couldn’t whilst she was redressing a wound.   
  
“I noticed.” He was amused. At her expense, in this case. _Oh, how the tables had turned._ “Your eyes travel.”

“If you run into my vision, of courseI’m going to see you.” She sniffed through her nose, cleared her throat, straightened her back a little, cleared her throat and looked solely at the box of bandages. “That and your reave is amazing to watch. I only know one Asari that can do that and that was nowhere near as _formidable_ as yours.”  
  
“So you _are_ flirting.”  
  
“No I’m not. I’m… stating facts.” She flicked open the box and pulled out the roll. “You’ve got more on your list of deployments, you’re a teacher - granted a very handsome one which I thought impossible - and you’re...very difficult to not think about. A lot.” Phoenix found herself sighing when he once again looked at her in triumph. It was only a matter of time before he had freed her from the whole she was digging herself into. “I was never any good at flirting, Kaid.” And she set to work on bandaging Kaidan up. “It always sounds creepy to me when I attempt flirting.”

Kaidan’s expression softened, she cast a glance up at him. He wasn’t looking at her anymore, but she knew he was paying attention. “I think it enduring.”  
  
“Enduring?” She questioned as if it was silly to think of it as such. It wasn’t in a malicious manner, more akin to a look she’d give Minerva when she’d done something stupid.   
  
“Yeah.”  
  
“How so?” She finished off, securing the bandage after checking it’s tightness.  
  
“You’re usually confident in who you are, and then I see an unconfident version of you who isn’t taking herself seriously.”

“And then I get teased by my boyfriend and he calls it enduring when I get embarrassed, huh?” She leaned back, pulling off the medical gloves as she examined her handiwork.

“Something like that.”  
  
Amused, Phoenix replied with a short laugh - a humoured exhalation from her nose mostly - and settled behind Kaidan. “Alright then. You’ll continue finding it enduring like I find your fumbles enduring” She pressed her right cheek against his back, his skin warm against hers, and wrapped her arms (bear from the vest top she had changed into an hour before) around his waist.

It had been around a month since the pair got together again. Of course, it wasn’t the same as before - for starters, she was acting more as a Spectre than an Alliance CO despite her dog tags, and secondly, eighty-three was three years ago. She was dead in eight four and co-operating with her nemesis to stop the collectors in eighty-five. Plus blowing up a relay to buy the galaxy more time, being under house arrest for six months… That’s hardly the ‘Hero’ she was described as.   
There were things that happened that weren’t the happiest or most welcoming, but they’d been discussed and water under the bridge. Their ‘spats’ (not that she deemed them as such, they were more akin to disagreement than an argument in her eyes) were hardly sacrilegious. There was nothing unforgivable that happened. He acted as she would have done, as anyone would have done. And frankly? She deserved them.

He wasn’t one to beat around a bush and she valued that - it was generally the best advice given. He was a man of integrity, compassion. Sometimes that made him as stubborn as a mule, but so was she when she put her mind to it. Kaidan was…. Kaidan. And she couldn’t envision him as anyone else. That was his charm.

It was why, unlike her previous fleeting crushes that lasted a maximum of three hours, she never stopped. Not even for a second. Even when they disagreed on a larger scale than what flavour of kit-kat was the best.  
  
“Comfortable?”  
  
“Hm?” Phoenix tilted her head up a little. “Oh. Yeah.”

Kaidan took her hand. “Tired?”  
  
“A little.” A moment of thought. “I was thinking…”  
  
“About?”

“How much I love you.”   
  
“Oh?”  
  
“Yeah.” She straightened and shifted to sit next to him. Phoenix took his hand, wove her fingers between his. “I love you a lot.”  
  
“I’m glad.” He brought her hand to his lips and kissed her knuckles, a gentle peck against the faint scar left behind from Earth’s attack. He lightly pulled her with him as he leaned back against the bed. “I love you, too.”


End file.
